


Broken (Frerard)

by trxgician



Category: Electric Century, Fall Out Boy, Gerard Way and the Hormones, My Chemical Romance, Panic! at the Disco, frnkiero andthe cellabration
Genre: Frerard, M/M, Ryden
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-18
Updated: 2016-01-18
Packaged: 2018-05-14 18:14:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5753344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trxgician/pseuds/trxgician
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"The funny thing is, if I break I don't think anybody would really care but me. If I break I'll just be a pile of shards by the toilet in the handicapped stall, a pile of Gerard shards, and nobody would even notice that I'm gone. Life would go on, and even though there wouldn't be any more Gerard drawings or Gerard at all, life would still go on, because it's not like anyone really cares about me anyways." <br/>With every minute that passes, Gerard is breaking. He can feel the skin beginning to crack, he can feel the facade beginning to lift. He knows that he doesn't have much time left, so he takes it upon himself to find someone to remember him. <br/>Frank is breaking too, in his own way. His family is falling apart, everything he's put his heart and soul into has abandoned him. He starts to lose faith in himself and everything he lives for. <br/>Two broken boys. A million broken pieces.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Broken (Frerard)

**Author's Note:**

> a/n: hi everyone :3 this is my first fic, so i hope i did pretty well. if you liked, feel free to let me know (:  
> (warning: i haven't edited this at all yet so i apologize if there's any mistakes)

**_Gerard_ **

"Sometimes people ask if I miss him. And my answer's the same: I will always miss him."

_-via an interview of Frank Iero, dated September 3, 2025_

I'm breaking, I'm breaking, I'm falling through the cracks and I can't do this anymore, I'm breaking I'm breaking I'm breaking

My eyes are pressed shut so tight I think my eyelids might start bleeding, it hurts it hurts it hurts but I know that if I open my eyes I'll see it, my skin cracking and falling apart, the shards tumbling to my feet and breaking, leaving the glass of my skin everywhere until I'm broken.

I'm in the school bathroom and I'm sitting on the floor of the handicapped stall, holding onto the slick metal railing, sitting on my knees and hovering just above the toilet so that when I throw up it'll be okay. The knees of my jeans are soaked in a puddle of who-knows-what beside the toilet, and they're my favorite jeans my favorite jeans my favorite jeans

I'm breaking

It'sokayokayokayokay

I'mokayokayokayokay

The funny thing is, if I break I don't think anybody would really care but me. If I break I'll just be a pile of shards by the toilet in the handicapped stall, a pile of Gerard shards, and nobody would even notice that I'm gone. Life would go on, and even though there wouldn't be any more Gerard drawings or Gerard at all, life would still go on, because it's not like anyone really cares about me anyways.

It would be so easy to break.

I open my eyes and look down at my hands and they're cracking and my heart stops beating in my chest because a piece of my right hand, my favorite part of my hand, the part where I burned the flesh between my thumb and my index finger with the iron, has just cracked off and fallen to the floor and I'm screaming I'm broken I'm broken I'm broken

~

I'm in my room, and I'm drawing LYNZ, which is funny because LYNZ doesn't have to worry about stupid things like breaking inside the boys' bathroom at school. I glance at the patch of skin between my thumb and index finger, and it's brand-new, the scar gone, replaced with a new layer of soft, pink skin. The scar was pretty fucking cool, shaped like a crescent moon, but I don't really mind that it's gone. At least now I'm new again.

Today is different, because LYNZ is an alien instead of a human. Every time I draw her, she changes slightly, which is what I like about LYNZ. I guess there's a part of me in her. I just wish there were more parts of her in me.

Lola's sitting cross-legged on my bed, flipping through my copy of Dune, even though I know they're not interested. Their expression is bored and slightly irritated, and they look like they'd rather be skinning themselves alive than be sitting with me. I know what they want, but I don't care.

"Do you _always_ have to draw whenever I'm around?" Lola whines, flipping the page so hard that I hear it tear. I can feel a bit of my arm crack, the bottom of my elbow, but it's not that bad. I pick up another pencil to shade in the side of LYNZ's face.

"I draw all the time, not just when you're here. Don't think you're so special." I continue shading. I know Lola will be mad at me for saying that but to be honest, they're at the back of my mind right now. I drop my shading pencil and pick up another one, going over LYNZ's expression, sullen and serious. I imagine that someone's just confessed their love to her. LYNZ doesn't love anyone back.

Lola sighs and gets up from my bed, the old mattress squeaking as they stand up. They walk over to my desk where I'm sitting and rest their chin on my shoulder, peering over at my drawing. A strand of their bubblegum pink hair falls into my face. "Why do you draw that girl all the time? Don't you know how to draw anything else?" They run a finger over the drawing, smudging up LYNZ's face. My fist clenches around the pencil.

"Of course I know how to draw other things. I just don't want to."

"You're so obsessed with this girl," Lola says accusingly, like LYNZ is a real fucking person and I'm about to cheat on Lola with her.

"You're so obsessed with getting in my damn business," I snap, shutting my sketchbook closed and dropping my pencil on my desk. I can feel the shard underneath my elbow peel off more, and I resist the urge to gag.

Lola rolls their eyes and rubs their temples. They've got another migraine. They always tell me that they get them because of me – nice way to make someone feel like an utter piece of shit, as if I don't already know. Lola and I hate being around each other, yet neither of us has any intention to break up. I don't know what it is about us – some kind of magnetic attraction or something – that keeps us bound to one another. It's been three years that we've been together. I guess when two people don't have anyone else to turn to, it's just natural for them to hold onto each other.

I stare back down at the drawing and cringe. Now that I look over it, I find so many more mistakes that I hadn't noticed before: LYNZ's eyes are slightly slanted, her lips are too big, and Lola's smeared out her face so much that it's barely recognizable. I feel like I'm about to explode – shatter into a million pieces.

I shut my eyes tight and count to seventeen – my lucky number.

When I reopen them, Lola is once again sprawled out on my bed, scrolling through their cell phone, their brightly painted blue nails tapping lightly on the screen. I keep my eyes focused on them, watching as their right eye twitches ever so slightly, as they run their tongue over their lips, scrunches up their nose and squints their eyes at something they must've seen. All the while, I can feel the skin on my elbow start to fester, molding into a tight little ball, ready to peel off my skin. Just the thought of losing so many shards in one day makes my fingers tremble.

"Let's do something." My voice is urgent, desperate, so loud that Lola's eyes widen and they look up at me in confusion. I need something to get my mind off the cracks in my body.

Suddenly interested, Lola sits up, propping their arm against my white pillow, their hair slightly grazing the side of their bare shoulder. They place her phone in their lap and crosses one leg over the other, narrowing their eyes at me, like they're trying to figure something out. "We can get pancakes. I heard there's a good place a few blocks from the high school," they say quietly, in that silky voice of theirs.

I'd prefer to be anywhere but near the high school, but at this point I have nothing else in mind, so I nod slowly and stand up, grabbing my keys off the desk. I tuck them into my pocket, feeling the skin scratch against the sleeve of my jacket, and take another deep breath. My mind threatens me with the thought I've been trying so hard to push away: you're breaking.

Lola's already in the doorway, their black backpack slung over their shoulder, still watching me with their dark, almond-shaped eyes. They look surprised, probably because I'm actually agreeing to go somewhere with them. Lola's always pressuring me to get out of the house, and ninety percent of the time I refuse to leave. I'd much rather sit in my room and draw, or read comics, or listen to music, because they're all so easy to do. The outside world is so much more unpredictable.

~

When I was in fifth grade, I began to try incredibly hard to make friends.

Prior to that year, I'd always been that kid who sat at the bench by himself during recess, coloring by himself without a care in the world. I was little; nobody really understood. My parents knew I didn't have any friends, but they'd always assumed I was just a shy kid and I'd eventually blossom into some kind of social butterfly later on.

But when fifth grade rolled around and everyone started getting a little older, my teacher became concerned. I can't remember her name anymore, but one day she came over to my house, sat down with my parents in the living room, and told them that something was wrong. I was completely antisocial.

That night, my mom came into my room after my brother had already fallen asleep and tucked me in for the first time since I had turned six. She sat down at the foot of my bed, squishing my tiny toes, and patted my ankles and asked me if I had any friends at school.

I lied.

I told her that Brendon Urie – the most popular kid in my class – was my best friend. I told her that all the girls chased me around on the playground every day. I told her that no, of _course_ I didn't sit alone during lunch.

Then she asked me why I was lying, and I remember closing my eyes and taking a deep breath and feeling my heart beating so fast and that was the first time I legitimately cracked – right underneath my heel, and it hurt so bad I screamed and woke up my little brother, and I didn't stop crying until my parents drove me to the emergency room and the doctor assured me that my heel was perfectly fine. That's when I stopped crying and started trembling because I knew that this – breaking – was something only I could see. It was something no doctor could diagnose. I was breaking and nobody would ever notice.

The next day I dressed in my best shirt, the shirt that was only reserved for Easter and Christmas, and tucked it into my pants because I knew that's how all the boys in my class did it. My dad offered to comb my hair for me and put so much gel that I had a clean layer of what felt like slime on my head. I walked into class that morning with a fake smile on my face and sat down right next to Brendon Urie even though that wasn't my seat.

I kept up the act for the rest of fifth grade. Every single night I would lay in my bed for hours on end, watching the clock tick, feeling my entire body break apart right there on those white sheets, my arms pressed tight to my sides, my teeth clenched and my eyes shut tight. I was so fucking scared that I couldn't cry even if I wanted to. I would count to seventeen over and over and over, feeling my body crumble around me – seventeen because that was my class number if you counted in alphabetical order. Then in the morning I would get up, new again, brushing the shards underneath my bed, and get ready like nothing had ever happened. By the end of the year I had already gone through twelve layers. Twelve layers of my skin that I would never get back.

On the last day of school, Brendon Urie passed out invitations for his pool party for that Friday. Technically, his mom was throwing it, and everyone in the class had gotten an invitation, but I still felt special, like Brendon Urie, the Brendon Urie, had chosen me to come to his party. I hugged that invitation to my chest the entire way home and even pinned it to the fridge to show off my party invitation. Mikey was only in third grade but I still made sure to remind him constantly that I had a lot of friends and he didn't, even though Mikey probably had more friends than me. I liked feeling _wanted_.

Then the day of the party came around and I made my mom take me to the nearest store to buy swimming trunks, even though I didn't know how to swim. I picked out the most expensive blue ones, the ones with a fancy beach print on them, and stuffed them into the shopping cart, practically bouncing on my toes with excitement. On the way home I told my mom how many friends I'd made over the year, and she seemed really happy for me, but maybe I was just so excited that I didn't really pay attention to her.

I remember pulling up to Brendon Urie's driveway. He lived in a mansion on the better side of Belleville, and even at a young age I could tell that Brendon was pretty rich. He had a driveway that was like a half-circle connecting to the street, and a house that was three stories, which was a lot different from my house, which was one-story and only had two bedrooms. I could see kids running around in the front yard, throwing water balloons, and my stomach got a little queasy. I didn't recognize any of these kids. There were a lot more than just my class, which only had nineteen students.

My mom parked in the driveway, kissed me on the cheek, and then I got out of the car, feeling really self-conscious and lonely. I felt like I did before I'd made friends. I went to the backyard and watched as some girls from my class laughed with each other and ate hot dogs in the grass. I sat down at the edge of the pool and that's when I began to wonder if these kids were really my friends at all.

And then it all happened.

I should've realized when Brendon and some other kids sat down with the girls in the grass and asked to play truth or dare. I should've realized when I happened to look over and locked eyes with Brendon, who had already been staring at me. I should've realized when Brendon stood up, his eyes still glued to mine, and said that he had to use the bathroom. But it was too late.

One moment I was sitting on the edge of the pool, swishing my feet back and forth in the water, and the next I felt a hand on the small of my back, and that's when I realized and I opened my mouth to scream but it was too late, too late too late and then I was in the water and it was really cold and I couldn't swim. I tried to scream again but I just inhaled a ton of water, and I started kicking around and moving my hands back and forth but I couldn't push myself upwards, and I could feel another layer coming off and I knew that if I broke right then and there I would die, I would drown in that pool, that pool at that stupid party that I never should've gone to in the first place.

I lifted my hand up and felt someone grab onto it, and a second later I was pulled out of the water and dragged onto the cement surrounding the pool by Brendon's older cousin. My eyes were full of tears and I couldn't see but I threw up that pool water everywhere, all over the ground and then I slipped and just lay there for a while, feeling my body crack like an egg someone's dropped to the ground. I could hear Brendon laughing, his voice louder than the rest of the kids, but I could also hear the other kids giggling too, like I was some type of fucking clown to put on a show.

Brendon's mom came out and yelled at him, and then she called my mom to pick me up, but my mom was at work and wouldn't be able to pick me up until at least another hour or two. Brendon's mom offered me a towel and a hamburger, but I refused and trudged out to the front yard, my own Walk of Shame, and sat on the curb, hugging my knees to my chest, and cried for what felt like eternities until my mom finally showed up.

After that, I stopped trying so hard to impress people. I started slinking into the shadows, keeping my head low, going out of my way to make sure I didn't have any "special quality" about me that might make other people notice me. I sat by myself at lunch all throughout middle school and I was fine with it. As long as I didn't break again. I knew I didn't have many more layers left.

And it worked. I didn't break for years. No cracks, no shards, nothing.

Until now.

~

It's a little diner, a few streets away from the high school, a place that's probably been open for years but is a real hole-in-the-wall. The big neon sign decorating the front of the building is only half-lit up, and one of the letters has broken off and is hanging down off the side of the wall. There are a few kids standing in front of a group of cars.

Immediately my eyes focus on Brendon, who is in the center of the pack, leaning against one of the cars. His glasses are drooping low on the bridge of his nose and his hair is slightly mussed up in the back. He has his arms wrapped around another guy who's standing next to him, with fuzzy brown hair and a black hat. Brendon Urie, the first openly gay person at our school – also the most popular person at school. Before Brendon came out, if you were gay you were shunned by everyone else, but now it's become something that everyone wants to be. I watch as Brendon leans close to the guy and whispers something in his ear before glancing over at my car. My palms start to sweat.

Lola must notice, because they look over at me, their lips pursed, and asks, "Are you okay?"

"I'm okay." My fingers are trembling.

"Are you sure?"

I close my eyes, bite my bottom lip, and breathe in, counting to seventeen. "I'm okay. Trust me."

And then we're out of the car, walking towards the diner, and Lola's holding my hand, not because either of us really want to but because we have an unspoken pact to protect each other, and our heads are low but still I manage to find myself in Brendon Urie's radar.

"Yo, G!" he calls out, and Lola squeezes my hand. They move to walk faster, but I keep a steady pace. I can feel my entire arm begin to crack, just like it did that day. "Gerard! Don't ignore me! That's rude!" Brendon says it in a sing-song way, and it makes me want to curl up into a little ball and die.

I just ignore him – it's really hard because I know how much crap he'll put me through at school on Monday but I know I can't break anymore. I don't deserve to live the rest of my life – however short it may be – constantly scared out of my mind over some kid at school.

As soon as we get into the tiny building, I collapse into a booth, my hands shaking, my eyelids fluttering. The scary part is that I can feel it, I can feel the skin coming off and it's the second time in my life that I won't be lying in my bed when I crack, besides this morning when I was in the bathroom. And even though it doesn't hurt as much as it did when I was only a kid, it still hurts like a motherfucker, and besides, just the thought of my skin peeling off, pooling in my sleeve and rotting, makes me sick.

Lola orders some stupid thing to eat but just imagining Brendon standing outside, waiting for me to come out, and my body _literally fucking falling apart_ makes me lose my appetite. How the fuck am I supposed to eat when I know I'm _this close_ to dying?

It's stupid. People think that I choose not to eat on purpose. My mom used to yell at me because I refused to eat, but nobody understands. Nobody understands that I'm so afraid of death that I can't stomach a single thing. Nobody will ever understand.

I can't take it anymore. I stand up, my legs feeling like jelly, and stumble to the bathroom. My heart is beating so fast that I'm starting to see black around the edges of my vision and and and and my elbow is coming off and my skin my skin my skin my skin mysk in

I'm pushing the door open and I'm on the floor it's cold down here my skin is falling apart

_is this what dying feels like?_

I'm crying like a stupid fucking baby and I'm dying i can feel the skin falling off my bones and ohmy god this is the last layer I thought I still had more time i thought i had time

my skin is all over the floor and i'm dead and it's okay because this is exactly what i wanted this entire time, because now it's over and i don't have to live my life in fear anymore and isn't that what i always hoped for? to finally be done with everyone and have the ability to be happy, because i can't remember the last time i was actually happy.

but now i'm dying and this isn't what i wanted

not yet not yet noty et

are you okay are you okay get up get up

someone is yelling and shaking my shoulder and please don't let me die give me more time

you're not going to die get up please

and then i'm dead.

~

I've told three people the story of that day, the day of Brendon's party: my mom, my dad, and Lola. But I've never told them what happened when I left, before my mom picked me up.

I was sitting on the curb, my head hung low, tears streaming down my face. My hands were shaking harder than ever before and I could feel myself starting to crack, but I refused to let myself break on the street. I was terrified that if I didn't break on my bed like usual, I'd just die there.

The tears were slipping onto the ground, but they were mixing with the water that was already pooled on the cement from my dripping hair. If my face hadn't been so red and splotchy, you wouldn't have been able to tell I'd been crying.

I could hear kids laughing behind me. I could hear kids still playing as if nothing had even happened, as if I hadn't been pushed, as if I hadn't even existed at all. And at that moment, I felt like my existence was just some kind of sick joke.

And then there was a hand on my shoulder, soft and smooth, shaking me slightly, and a voice: "Are you okay?"

I didn't bother to look up, because I'd assumed it was one of Brendon's stupid friends, still trying to get a kick out of me. I bit my lip and kept my eyes focused on the puddle of pool water underneath my feet.

The person sat down next to me, and he was a lot smaller than I was. I couldn't see his face through my peripheral vision, but I could see long brown hair that went down just past his ears. He was quiet for a long time, clasping his hands and unclasping them. Finally he let out a loud breath and began to talk. "I'm Brendon's next-door neighbor. I didn't get invited to his party, because I'm only in third grade." He paused. "You don't have to cry."

I wanted to tell him to go away. I wanted to scream at him. I wanted to take off running down the street until my feet bled. I wanted to be left alone.

The boy tapped his foot on the ground a few times. He was wearing nice shoes, nicer than any shoes I'd ever worn before. "If you want, you can come over. I have video games. My mom made lasagna."

I didn't want to be known as the kid who hung out with a third grader. But more importantly, I didn't want to be known as the kid who cried on the curb outside Brendon Urie's house. So I wiped away my tears with the back of my hand, stood up, and followed the boy to the house next door.

He was really short, and had messy brown hair, and eyes that were a color I couldn't exactly place. He was scrawny, much tinier than I was, and had a smile wider than anyone I could think of. As we trudged through his front yard, he turned to me, grinning, and said, "I know your brother, Mikey. He's in my class. I'm Frank. Has he talked about me before?"

I shook my head, and Frank only looked slightly disappointed before he started talking about all the videogames he owned, and I just tuned him out. The kid talked more than a white mom gossiping to her friends.

We played Halo for an hour before his mom told him to stop, and I went back to Brendon's front yard and waited on the edge of the street until my mom came ten minutes later. Frank was standing in his front yard, his floppy hair covering his eyes, and he told me come over again soon.

I never did, and I also never saw Frank again. Mikey had never mentioned him, and as far as I knew, he didn't attend Belleville High School, or even live in the same house anymore. It was as if Frank had pretty much disappeared off the face of the earth – or my small New Jersey town, anyway.

So imagine my surprise when I regained consciousness and saw that the person who'd witnessed my meltdown in the bathroom of that small diner was the same kid I'd played video games with the day of Brendon Urie's pool party.

 


End file.
